The organization “Save The Nickel Plate” issued a news release Tuesday, saying US Rail Holdings is appealing previous decisions by the federal Surface Transportation Board, and asking the board to allow the company to operate and purchase the Nickel Plate Line as a passenger train operation. The City of Fishers says US Rail is filing the exact same arguments filed last year that the board rejected.
Save the Nickel Plate asserts in the release, “…the City of Fishers is now facing a significant challenge to their trail-only plan.” The city argues otherwise.
“The latest filing by US Rail Holdings is merely an attempt to re-litigate its failed position before the Surface Transportation Board,” the City of Fishers responded in a statement.
The city points-out that the Surface Transportation Board’s December 2018 decision allowing the Nickel Plate Trail to move forward still stands.
According to Save the Nickel Plate, US Rail says First Transit has agreed to work with US Rail in providing passenger rail service to Union Station.
The city says it “does not support any proposal that leads to freight cars travelling through neighborhoods and clogging Fishers’ main thoroughfares multiple times a day.”
The US Rail request for an injunction from the Surface Transportation Board wants the board to order Fishers not to remove any rails along the Nickel Plate until the board rules on US Rails request to reactivate the rail line.
Fishers is moving forward with plans to begin converting the Nickel Plate Line to a trail, with construction scheduled to begin this fall.
Save the Nickel Plate has been arguing that the city did not properly consider a proposal to use concepts allowing a trail alongside the rails. Fishers argued its engineers had looked at the rails plus trails idea and rejected it. The City of Fishers then released an engineering study in February, 2019, conducted by Indianapolis engineering firm Butler, Fairman & Seufert, which estimated a trails and rails plan would at least cost an additional $20.5 million.
Save the Nickel Plate is planning a public meeting “to explore the feasibility and benefits of a rail-with-trail design as an alternative to the trail-only concept proposed by the City of Fishers.” That meeting will be held April 8th, 6pm, at the building at Holland Park.